


I Hate Myself For Losing You

by DaisukeKazamatsuri



Category: Kami Nomi zo Shiru Sekai | The World God Only Knows
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bottling of Feelings, F/M, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-26
Updated: 2015-11-26
Packaged: 2018-05-03 13:14:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5292194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DaisukeKazamatsuri/pseuds/DaisukeKazamatsuri
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Keima's thoughts are in perpetual turmoil, and his feelings are even worse.  Chihiro is watching him, and her questions add to the pile.  When Ayumi finally corners the gamer on the roof and asks Chihiro's only question herself, Keima breaks.</p>
<p>A glimpse into what might have happened after the fact.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Hate Myself For Losing You

**Author's Note:**

> So, this is based in the anime. I have not finished the manga. I wrote this while listening to "I Hate Myself for Losing You" by Kelly Clarkson. I will not be writing another story for this fandom (98% positive). This anime and school are why I have not been writing for When You Walk Into My Life And We Connected.

Keima's thoughts were perpetually in turmoil. Every action he took was questioned and analyzed in his head, turned over and over and over again. Even as he went through the motions, finishing new games, playing more routes in school, capturing more loose souls, his thoughts never went away.

Chihiro's looks and questions didn't help, she was always watching him in class, seemed to keep popping up when he was on a conquest. She didn't seem angry when she saw him those times, as if she could tell he was just acting -- she did know why he was doing it now, after all. She wouldn't stop asking that question, either. It felt like she was just waiting for the moment he dropped his guard, waiting for his answer. He never did, though, because he knew that the bye-bye she had given him that day had meant to be final. He knew that if he answered her, and especially if he answered her while he still had to capture loose souls, it would end in disaster. Not that he knew what he would say.

Worse still were the feelings, though. He no longer got any satisfaction from reaching the endings with other girls, only relief. Relief that the conquest was over and he wouldn't have to see them anymore, relief that he could drop his pretenses for a little while and go back to normal. His heart ached, and no matter how many happy endings he found in games, or loose soul endings he completed, the hole never went away.

Keima felt like a bottle with a black hole inside it, consuming everything inside and tugging at the cork, pulling it tight against the glass and straining to pull it free at the same time. He knew he was going to break sooner or later, that the dam would burst and he'd turn into a supernova, expelling everything he'd condensed into that black hole. What he didn't expect was for Ayumi to be the trigger.

The roof had been a sanctuary for so long that it didn't occur to him that other people knew where to find him when he was running away from his problems. Elsie was off on some errand or other, Keima didn't particularly care, but when he heard footsteps he found it odd. After all, the devil never really walked places when she was approaching him and knew they were alone. So he turned to look, for once not so engrossed with his PFP that he didn't notice the approaching presence.

The track star was walking up to him with a look that was at once reluctant and determined, half stomping her feet as if to scare him off, but taking small steps as if she were trying to get near a wild animal. Ayumi was a walking contradiction, almost literally, and Keima had to wonder what the hell was wrong to put her in this state. She stopped in front of him, and her expression finally resolved into determination, and spoke, "Why did you go on a date with Chihiro?"

The question was like a knife, pulled from his mind and stabbed into his heart, leaving Keima's thoughts spilling into the air and his heart full of pain. The gamer turned off his PFP, for once not caring that he hadn't reached a save point, and felt the cork on his heart come free.

"Because it never occurred to me."

Ayumi was taken aback, "What?"

Keima payed her no mind, the words now spilling from him like poison. "My life had been filled with games, it was all I'd really needed, or at least I had thought so. Then Elsie comes down from the sky and this collar wraps around my neck and I'm stuck interacting with real world girls with real world problems that seem to follow the paths in my games."

Neither Keima nor Ayumi notice Chihiro come to the roof and quietly hide behind the tree behind them as she listens in.

"None of them remember, though, when I've filled the gaps in their hearts, and so my life goes on as usual otherwise. Then I find out that Chihiro had a loose soul, and it seemed like I could get her to fall in love with someone else and have it work out. So I coach her through it like she's the main character, only, she falls for me instead. But she forgets, too, and I thought, 'good, I don't have to coach her anymore' like she was exactly the same.

"And then, then Diana asks me to find her sisters, and Kanon approaches me, throws herself at me, because she remembers, only to get attacked. Suddenly I have to find the other goddesses and the only clue I have is that a girl who is host to a goddess remembers the conquest. So I use Kanon's enthusiasm to my advantage, seeing which of my previous conquests is mad at me for getting a kiss from her in the middle of the hallway."

Keima hasn't looked up from the ground, and Ayumi is too shocked by his extended confession to speak again. Tears have made tracks down his face and stains on the inside of his glasses, and the gamer can't really see anything anymore, "I narrow it down to five girls, and I know that four of them are goddesses. So I work on re-conquering all of them, because I suddenly have a week before Kanon is dead and war breaks out between the two Hells and they destroy half of the Earth. I find three of them without much trouble, and get them to release their power just as easily, and suddenly I have to figure out if it's you or Chihiro that has a goddess inside them.

"So I decide to focus on you, even though I'm sick, ESPECIALLY since I'm sick, because sick events are the most powerful in the gaming world. But then Chihiro shows up, and I know I have to work on her too, and she confesses her love. You tell me to go for her instead, and I do, and the entire time we're together, I'm at a loss. All of my knowledge, all of the information that helped me with the other girls is just not there, my mind has gone blank, and then, just as I'm about to kiss her, to release the goddess I thought was inside her--"

Keima sobs and has to stop, his hands covering his face as his glasses dangle by the slightest grip. Ayumi sits next to him for comfort, but doesn't touch him. She doesn't dare.

Eventually Keima regains some composure, but tears are still falling and he's getting a killer headache, but he can't stop now. "But she tells me to be gentle, that it's her first time, her first kiss, and my mind kicks into overdrive. After all, I'd already kissed her, and if she had a goddess inside her, she would have remembered that, but she doesn't. Suddenly I have to switch paths again, I have to conquer you, because you're the one with the goddess and I have less than two days before war breaks out, but I can't do Chihiro at the same time, so I back away."

Chihiro, out of sight, has a hand covering her mouth to keep herself quiet as sh cries herself.

"I said some really harsh things, but I hadn't really meant any of them. Because I'd taken her on that date, and I-...I-... I'd had so much fun. It wasn't until after you hit me that the rest of what she told me that night got through to me. That she'd liked me since the spring, long before even my conquest of her, that she had fallen in love with ME and not just some projection I put on to get rid of the loose soul in her heart like most of the other girls had."

Keima stopped to catch his breath, the words running too fast for his lungs to keep up, and Ayumi placed a hand gently on his back in a friendly gesture. Behind the tree, Chihiro felt a fresh wave of tears pour down her face.

"And then I realized that I had almost run after her to stop her from leaving. I realized then and there that I had fallen in love with her, too. And it had never occurred to me that anyone could possibly fall in love with me, so I let her run, and I bottled it up, and I tried to move on."

Keima fell silent at last, and Chihiro stepped out from the shade, and Ayumi backed away and quietly left the roof. Keima didn't look up, but Chihiro knew that he was aware of her, had probably been aware of her since she'd gotten to the roof.

"I'm sorry, Chihiro, but until I can get rid of this thing," Keima tugged at the collar around his neck, "I can't be who you want me to be."

Chihiro let a watery smile cross her face and knelt in front of the gamer, "I know. And I know that you have to get other girls to fall in love with you for your own life's sake. I can't promise I'll be happy with it, or that I'll be ready to be with you when you're done, but I can promise you that right now, it's okay. That right now, I know you love me and that I know even if I falter, you'll get me to fall in love with you again, and I'll be okay with that."

Keima locked eyes with Chihiro, unable to cry anymore, and the two leaned into each other...

...and kissed.

**Author's Note:**

> Please comment! This fandom needs more fluff between these two!!!!


End file.
